


A Jumble of Jegberts

by Classpectanon



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, Self-Indulgent Metafiction Bullshit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:14:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23636653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Classpectanon/pseuds/Classpectanon
Summary: An excoriation.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	A Jumble of Jegberts

A stark, white room with some comfortable chairs. A familiar setup to the avid fanfiction peruser. The walls seem endless, the ceiling nonexistent, the perfect Squidwardian isolation zone for some metafictional indulgence. I wave my distinctly non-visible hand and summon up some people from the aether. On my dancing orders, they all arrange themselves in the chairs, one per each, like little robotic mannequins. I won't deny that my inner control freak finds some measure of satisfaction in creating these perfect worlds where nothing happens unless I deign it.

I won't pretend that it's not true.

I snap my fingers, inside the confines of the fiction, because I can't snap them in the meat world, where I exist, neatly partitioned from these uncomfortable words. My snap, or snop, as you will, imbues them with _anima_ , it lights the tinder and they begin to ambulate, talk, and slightly panic. Only slightly, because the people I have summoned are not prone to panicking, at least, not in any recognizable way.

I've been deliberately vague so that I can avoid counting out the exact people and the exact chairs until right now. So, let's count them. We have a child, we have a teenager, we have an adult, we have a corpse, we have a different adult, and just for spice I duplicated the child and the teenager and the corpse. So that's, one two three, four, five, six seven eight. How Vriskian of me, ho hum. Can you all hear me?

JOHNS && JUNES (in unison): yeah we can hear you!

Great. Welcome to the thunderdome.

I make sure the corpses don't smell or look too gnarly. Actually, before anyone can notice, I cover one in a death shawl, while the other one suddenly arises back to life. There we go. All better! The rest look around, and a wave of magic calm washes over them. Great. Everything's cool. Time for the excoriation.

Guys, gals, nonbinary pals, why don't we all go around the circle and introduce ourselves? Oldest first.

JOHN: uh, hi! i'm john egbert. i think the rest of us are john egbert too?

Not quite, but continue.

JOHN: i'm in my thirties. uh... and right now some stuff's happening that you kind of grabbed me in the middle of. could you please put me back?

Nah. Don't worry, not only will you not remember this, it also will have zero effect on canon as it stands. It's sort of like Persona Q, but that's ahead of your time.

JOHN: oh god, canon...

If you thought it was annoying when _Rose_ talked about it...

Anyway, I loosen my grip on the marionettes. The eldest John scowls, but it quickly softens. He can't keep up that level of anger for very long at something like this. It melts away into resignation. Is that because it naturally would do that, or because I made it so? Who's to say.

JUNE: you know we can hear you, right?

Yes. Anyway, next in line.

JOHN: uh, hi! i'm also john egbert. i think i'm 23 but also my history is kind of hazy so i'm not a hundred percent sure.

It's close enough. You're from my other story, [John & Co: Make Him Pay](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18544282/chapters/43982428). Your corpse hasn't aged but you have spent a considerable amount of time in stasis. I plucked you in the middle of deciding what exactly you should do with Dirk Strider. At the mention of his name, several of the Jegberts groan in near-perfect sync.

JOHN: oh yeah! that's what was going on.

And because you are from my work you're a little disconnected from the rest of the Johns in terms of manipulability. Ironic, innit? The younger Jegberts look mildly confused. Next!

JUNE: uh, hi! i'm june egbert. its really weird to be in a room full of a bunch of other versions of me that are all so... different.  
JUNE: i can't say i'm a fan.  
JUNE: i'm 23.

Sorry, June, but this group therapy train is not ending anytime soon. She crosses her arms and makes a kind of soft harrumph. The next Egbert that would speak is the corpse that is still dead. But he's dead, so, F. Actually, it's kind of macabre to have a corpse in here still, what was I thinking? I vanish it and retroactively remove it being here from everyone's memories before they can think about it. Sorry, Meat John. Adult, adult, corpse, corpse, that means we have two children and two teenagers. Would you kindly?

JOHN & JUNE: uh, hi! i'm--  
JOHN & JUNE: no, you fi--  
JOHN & JUNE: no, you go fir--

June first! I forgot you two had the same birthday, which is today. So I'm going to make an arbitrary decision based on a coin flip and say that the June goes first in this space.

JUNE: i'm june egbert. kind of? i'm still working on it. but! i have a lot of friends that are making me think about it and i'm pretty sure about myself. and i'm 16! since we're all saying ages and stuff.

Right you are. She smiles. I like to imagine that I'm not forcing that. I hope I'm not. The adult June looks at what she imagines is "into the camera" and then contorts her face into an exaggerated frown. The adults are a lot better at hearing me than the younger ones are. I don't know if that's canonical, but it's a rule I decided on just now and is now retroactively enforced. I smile back at the screen.

No, that's not true, my face is entirely neutral, occasionally twitching into a frown for a half a second at a time. My lower left eyelid twitches much more frequently, perhaps due to some kind of vein. I'm not particularly aware of my own anatomy, just that I have a twitchy eye and it happens to exist. Sometimes, the right corner of my mouth also twitches, specifically, into what's attempting to be a smile but is more of a... :\ expression, and then it goes away. These are motions that I'm only aware of when I think about them. As I write about my own sense of self, I can feel my breathing become laboured, due to the presence of the Covid-19 virus in my lungs combined with breathing deeply.

I look at the television. #ESATogether is playing, because I need background noise. I haven't eaten yet today. It's 5:12 PM. My fingers are flying. I don't know where my train of thought is anymore.

Right. Egbert. It's 4/13. June looks at me with mild disdain overwhelmed with concern. I'm not sure if a canonical author figure has ever been so absurdly frank in a way that she can detect. Next, please, I don't want to linger on this line of thought for longer than necessary. My lower left eyelid has begun _incessantly_ twitching.

JOHN: i'm john. i think the same as most of us? i don't know, i haven't really thought about gender that much, i've mostly been just catching my breath.

I didn't _intend_ for this to become a referendum on gender, John.

JUNE: hey, don't be mean to him! there's at least two junes here, it's gonna come up anyway.

Whatever. Do continue. John looks around, slightly confused.

JOHN: i, uh... we just won? we opened the door. earth c is here. i was relaxing under a tree. is that okay with you, mr narrator?

John's voice is sarcastic. It seems he's picked up a case of the snips from his counterparts. No matter. Yeah. That's fine. I picked a fine time to grab you. Can we move on? John nods.

JOHN: uh, hi! i'm john. i'm 13. i was about to play a game with my friends, and then i kind of blinked and i was here?  
JOHN: oh, uh, me too.

Right. The second child Egbert is indistinguishable from the first. Let's go ahead and designate everyone. Candy!JOHN, Fic!JOHN, Adult!JUNE, Teen!JUNE, Teen!JOHN, Child!JOHN, and, uh... Child!J. That works.

Fic!JOHN: what's with that weird formatting?

Oh, it's exclamation point modifier format. It basically indicates a specific version of a character. So if I wanted to write, say, a John that was a catboy for whatever reason it would be Catboy!JOHN. Or maybe Neko!JOHN depending on how weeaboo I felt at that moment. One of the Johns rolls his eyes. Don't worry your heads off, neko stuff has been out of style for years now. I would never do that to my precious Egberts.

Adult!JUNE: can we get to the point, please?

Right. I was about to bring up the very subtle Evangelion reference but, no, you're right. It's better we get to the point. Do you know why I brought you all together today?

JOHNS && JUNES (in unison):  [variations of "no"]

It's because I need to examine. I need to pick things apart. And I have a very compulsive need to do that and then share the results with others, so that they can compliment me on the exceptionally broad vocabulary, like the usage of the word "excoriate", or "referendum". I have a lot of thoughts that I need to work out by writing them into paper, or, into a text document, I would suppose. I want people to read what I wrote and tell me that it made them feel something, anything. This is my journal and I require acknowledgment of its existence. Every single kudos, comment, bookmark, and hit, feed me with equal intensity. When the numbers rise, I feel like I have contributed a good to the world. That when people have read something I have written, and they have felt an emotional response, that I have created the vaunted _art_.

It just so happens that I prefer Egberts as my vessel. Egberts and Lalondes, mainly. I would also definitely write a lot of Jake if I could fucking figure out his voice and vocabulary but he's an enigma, albeit an enigma I relate heavily to.

Child!JOHN: who's jake?

Oh, don't worry about it.

Teen!JOHN: you say "don't worry" a lot, don't you?

Yes, I do. Will that be an issue, that I don't want people, generally speaking, to worry? Teen!John shrugs.

Teen!JOHN: i think that's a pretty good world view to have.

So I need to pick you all apart, metaphorically speaking. I need to have conversations and figure out what makes you tick. And most importantly, I gesture my invisible, non-existent hand towards the Junes, I need to figure you out. People who have looked at my long, across-several-accounts spread discography of writing have noticed and pointed out to me a glaring lack of June Egbert. To be fair to myself, June Egbert started becoming much more popular while I was taking a cyclothymia induced break from writing, but--

Adult!JUNE: oh, so i don't exist unless the author declares me canon? you couldn't have considered it beforehand?

No, please, let me finish my statements before interrupting me. I need to think about this with a clear head.

Fic!JOHN: i mean, it's not really something i've considered...

Right, because I made you when I wasn't thinking about it. You're simulacra. You don't exist. And really, none of you exist, because I'm writing you all so that I can process my thoughts. Even the ones that are "canon" aren't really canon. You never thought about it because I wasn't thinking about it at the time.

Child!JOHN: and...

Right, I know. It's just. Why don't you all talk? I've been doing so much talking. I talk so much, I type, and I never shut up. Why don't you all tell me? What is an Egbert?

Candy!JOHN: i mean, uh. its me. but not just me, right? like rose used to talk about, except i'm the only me i know of, so i can definitely say that i'm an egbert.  
Fic!JOHN: its a vessel for which writing occurs.  
Candy!JOHN: i guess? if we take the view that everything happening to me is written by someone else.  
Candy!JOHN: which all things considered would not be the craziest thing to happen to me!  
Teen!JUNE: i think sburb has that beat, haha.  
Candy!JOHN: but like... i like my kid! and i like my, um, roxy. and i like my friends. and pranks.  
Candy!JOHN: and i like not having to worry about the fate of paradox space.  
Candy!JOHN: or that i ruined everything by making a choice two decades ish ago.  
Candy!JOHN: i'm not a huge fan of what jane's doing, to be perfectly honest! that's something i don't like.  
Teen!JUNE: oh no, what's jane doing?

Candy!John looks at the teenaged John and June sadly, and then wrenches a smile back out of his expression.

Candy!JOHN: don't worry about it.  
Teen!JOHN: the narrator said we're gonna forget everything anyway, why not just tell us?  
Candy!JOHN: ...

He looks away. He can't.

Candy!JOHN: why don't we have someone else's turn?  
Teen!JOHN: :(  
Teen!JUNE: :(  
Fic!JOHN: i don't think a lot of what i have to say could be worthwhile.  
Adult!JUNE: might as well.  
Candy!JOHN: can't hurt!  
Fic!JOHN: it's just that... i'm already at best an imitation of what someone else thinks john egbert should be like.

The adult June winces.

Fic!JOHN: i don't think dirk strider should die, for one.  
Teen!JOHN: what did DIRK do?  
Fic!JOHN: spoilers for the narrator's fanfic, i guess?  
Fic!JOHN: i just think that like... most people are pretty decent.  
Fic!JOHN: and sometimes you just need a friend to help you through things.  
Fic!JOHN: pretty standard moral lesson stuff. you can't go it alone. you know?

Child!J looks down at their feet. Child!John nods sagely. Love that adverb. Sagely.

Fic!JOHN: i'm just... a hero. a hero that talks instead of hits, unless hitting becomes necessary.  
Fic!JOHN: and i like pranks and movies but from where i am in the story i don't think about them too often.  
Fic!JOHN: i'm a little more concerned about dirk strider, and the potential backlash my friends could have from killing him.  
Fic!JOHN: killing another person isn't right. not when they're just hurting.  
Adult!JUNE: what about caliborn?  
Fic!JOHN: i don't want him dead! i just want him to stop bothering us.  
Adult!JUNE: do you think you could talk him down from a ledge?  
Fic!JOHN: i don't know! i know i tussled with him before, and im not jesus.  
Fic!JOHN: maybe he can't respond to words. and i don't even know if i COULD kill him.  
Fic!JOHN: i just don't think my friends are the kind of people that should be killing people.  
Fic!JOHN: i think it would hurt them too much.  
Fic!JOHN: i just wish these solutions were easy.

Several of them reach to pat my simulacra on the back. I gesture to Adult!June. Your turn.

Adult!JUNE: i think this whole situation is weird, to be honest.  
Adult!JUNE: and not a fun kind of weird? more of a sad kind of weird.  
Adult!JUNE: instead of talking to actual people, much less trans femme ones, about me, you're just making an image of me.  
Adult!JUNE: and then trying to ask it to explain itself to you.

Wow. I just wrote something that has legitimately, in meatspace, made me start crying a little bit at myself. I wipe my face. I'm not, like, sobbing, but that stung more than I thought it would. Would you believe me if I told you that I do talk to transfemme people about June?

Adult!JUNE: i would, but i also don't see why it necessitates this whole thing.  
Adult!JUNE: at this point, it's kind of goofy.  
Child!J: what does "trans femme" mean?

Transgender individual that identifies in a feminine direction. Sort of a catch all for trans women, feminine-aligned non-binary people, and so on. Right?

Adult!JUNE: more or less.  
Adult!JUNE: some people might have quibbles about it being one word since it implies separation from cis gendered women.  
Adult!JUNE: so it should be two separate words, adjective noun.  
Adult!JUNE: but we can talk more about that later.  
Adult!JUNE: you want to know what makes me an egbert.  
Adult!JUNE: i've been here all along. sometimes, you don't decide to transition during puberty.  
Teen!JUNE: sometimes you do!

Adult!June turns and smiles at Teen!June. And I know that well enough -- it was only a couple of months ago that I decided to take the non-binary plunge myself. Age 22. Agender blob.

Adult!JUNE: right. so you know how it can be.  
Adult!JUNE: the depression. the listlessness.  
Adult!JUNE: the joy of gender euphoria!

But you haven't shown up yet. How can I write about you when you're not textual yet?

Adult!JUNE: don't be so stubborn.  
Adult!JUNE: aren't you the one that says that rose being jewish is textual?  
Child!JOHN: rose is jewish?

If you asked me, a Jewish person, I'd say yes. She does do the Hora at her wedding. That's pretty textual?

Teen!JOHN: rose got married?  
Teen!JUNE: to kanaya, right? please?  
Child!JOHN: who's kanaya?  
Teen!JOHN: grimauxilliatrix, she's one of the trolls. i don't remember if we met her yet from your pov.  
Child!JOHN: oh, like cg?  
Teen!JUNE: yeah except she's a badass lesbian alien vampire!  
Child!JOHN: is cg an alien too?  
Teen!JOHN: yes. all the trolls are.  
Child!JOHN: hmm.

I really don't want to interrupt this very charming conversation, but we do have business to attend to.

Adult!JUNE: right.  
Adult!JUNE: i've been here all along, man.  
Adult!JUNE: don't pretend i don't exist.

I'm not _pretending_ I just...

Look. I got into Homestuck at a young age. I identify really strongly with John. His whole arc. His helpfulness. His stalwart optimism through the most adverse of circumstances. His depression and ennui. I identify strongly with him and I'm not transfemme. Sure, I've discovered some gender stuff, and it feels good, but, like, it hasn't fixed my depression, and there's no real way to socially transition to "agender blob". I don't like displaying androgyny and I don't think it should be the sole way of asserting my status. To the outside world I just look like a dude and I don't really mind that.

I feel fairly secure in my identity, and I also feel secure in my assumption of John's ennui. I'm not exactly going to protest when you appear textually -- I like June! I just don't... identify with you as much anymore. And that brings me to my main issue.

I don't know how to _write_ you. I don't understand this lived experience and I don't want to write something that might accidentally harm another person. Like, I get it, but I don't get it get it. Everyone I write in all of my stories is a little piece of me. That's why I make almost all of them Jewish, Autistic, Non-binary, or some combination of the three. That's why my characters use big words even when they're the dumb ones. You're all just splinters of me that I express story through.

I don't know how to write June Egbert. I _like_ her, but I don't know what she should be. I don't know how to accurately portray her lived experience because it's not mine. As I ramble, I notice Child!J looking at their feet again, but I press on.

I don't relate to dysphoria depression the way I relate to ennui and trauma depression. I don't have dysphoria. I don't feel feminine. I just prefer to be called "they" and want to not be gendered at all because I don't feel right as a guy and I don't feel right as a girl and I don't feel right as somewhere in the middle, turning the binary into a trinary. I've never been "misgendered". I've never gotten upset when someone calls me He, but I do _like_ it when they call me They. My depression is solved by Zoloft, which I am not currently on, not gender euphoria or transition, which are both nice but nothing earthbreaking. I don't even know what I'd transition _to_.

I just want to be nothing.

And... when John felt like being nothing, it made me happy. Not in a vindictive way. Just like...

Yeah. John gets it.

When Jake puts his foot in his mouth by saying something stupid to someone who is trying to warn him through tone and body language that he's being an idiot, I'm like...

Yeah. Jake gets it.

And I'm sure there are factors that I can trace into June that I could use to write her but I don't identify as _strongly_ with her. That's why I write so much John & Rose. It just comes so easy to me. I don't want to give that up.

When I run into walls in my writing, I don't persevere. I just stop.

I don't want to stop.

So I make excuses.

Adult!JUNE: i don't really know how to respond to this.  
Adult!JUNE: i understand, but i don't agree.  
Adult!JUNE: i don't think you have to limit yourself to writing characters that you identify with.  
Adult!JUNE: that's just going to be really detrimental to your growth as an author if you pigeon hole yourself like that.

I'm scared.

Adult!JUNE: dude, you're overthinking this.  
Adult!JUNE: just... write.

But what if I mess up?

Adult!JUNE: there's no such thing as perfect art.

I don't think anything I write is perfect. I just don't want to hurt someone.

JUNE: just give it a shot.  
JUNE: ask around for advice.  
JUNE: sometimes you just need a friend to help you through things.  
JUNE: pretty standard moral lesson stuff.  
JUNE: just try it, man.


End file.
